


405. serendipity

by piggy09



Series: The Sestre Daily Drabble Project [135]
Category: Orphan Black (TV)
Genre: Cuddling, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-12
Updated: 2016-11-12
Packaged: 2018-08-30 12:55:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 710
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8533894
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/piggy09/pseuds/piggy09
Summary: It gets cold in the tent once the sun goes down.





	

Helena wakes in the middle of the night to find that somehow she and Sarah have tangled together in their sleeping bags. She had waited until Sarah fell asleep to turn around, slowly, carefully, so that they were face to face – but she hadn’t inched closer, had just lain there and watched Sarah’s eyelids twitching as she dreamed. She hadn’t moved closer, not while awake.

But here they are. It’s almost like they’re touching, through the layers of fabric between them. Helena can feel the bump of Sarah’s knees against her own through her sleeping bag, and Sarah’s sleeping bag. They’re so close she can count Sarah’s eyelashes. She wants to, just to make this moment real. But she doesn’t.

She’s glad she decided not to when Sarah’s eyes open, sudden, startled, and they are looking at each other in the dark. Helena’s perfect mirror, blinking at her with a confused sleepiness and looking down. She studies the way their knees slot against each other. “’s cold,” she says, blinking.

“Yes,” Helena whispers. She can feel the press of the ground through the sleeping bag: it is cold.

Sarah blinks at her groggily, closes her eyes tight for a second like she can’t quite believe herself. “If I do this, you can’t kill me,” she mutters. “Or – stab me, or somethin’. You got it?”

“Yes,” Helena whispers. Sarah stares at her for a moment; her eyelids droop, then lever themselves back up. She sighs, shakes her head a little bit. Then she unzips her sleeping bag. “C’mere,” she says.

Helena unzips her own sleeping bag and inches closer tentatively. She can’t – quite believe that this is real, so she holds her breath and doesn’t question it. Sarah settles the sleeping bags so that Sarah’s is underneath them and Helena’s is over them and then she pulls Helena closer and burbles something Helena can’t understand and she’s right _there_ and she’s warm and Helena’s head was against her chest and now her head is against Helena’s chest so she gets it, she understands, she knows. Helena buries her face in Sarah’s hair. It smells like shampoo, and also sweat. Helena’s heart aches.

“ _Sestra_ ,” she whispers, and Sarah makes an irritated noise.

“Don’t,” she says. “This isn’t happening. We’re not talking about this. Go to _sleep_ , meathead.”

“Okay,” Helena says helplessly. But she doesn’t. She just lies there. She really doesn’t know what to do with her arms. Sarah is so warm. She can tell Sarah’s still awake, but Sarah said they’re not talking about this so Helena thinks she’s supposed to pretend Sarah is asleep. Or that she is asleep. Or both. What does she do with her arms? Can she wrap them around Sarah? Is that too much? What does Sarah want from her?

Sarah doesn’t tell her. Sarah doesn’t open her mouth and make any of this easy; she just lies there, warm, head against Helena’s chest like she knew how to do it the whole time. Like she’s always known, and she’s just been watching Helena try and figure it all out. Helena doesn’t even envy her for it. She’s glad at least one of them knows how to make it easy.

She bites the inside of her lip and slowly – slowly – lifts up one of her arms so she can wrap it around Sarah. She can feel the bones of Sarah’s back shifting as she goes tense and then – slowly – goes still. Something in Helena’s chest is purring, huge waves of warmth and contentment and Sarah is here and Helena is holding Sarah and Sarah isn’t afraid and Helena isn’t afraid either. They’re not going to talk about it in the morning. This isn’t happening. Sarah will wake up and shake herself loose of Helena like a cocoon and say _right, let’s go, Cold River_ and they won’t talk about it.

But right now Sarah is still awake, and this moment is real. Helena draws it on the wall of her heart to make sure it doesn’t get erased – two stick figures, wrapped around each other, holding each other tight and never letting go.

“I love you,” she whispers into Sarah’s hair. Tomorrow Sarah will never have heard her. Tonight she says, quietly: “I love you too.” 

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Please kudos + comment if you enjoyed! :)


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